US Congressman, US Senator. An 1843 graduate of what is today the University of Tennessee, he read law and was admitted to the Tennessee State Bar Association in 1845. He served in the Tennessee State Senate and in the Tennessee State Legislature, serving as Speaker of the House during the Secession Crisis from 1859 to 1861. When the Civil War began he was appointed as Adjutant General of Tennessee, and in that capacity facilitated the raising of thousands of troops for the Confederate Army in the beginning months of the conflict. He then served in the field through the end of the war as an assistant adjutant general and aide on the successive staffs of Confederate army Generals Samuel Reid Anderson, William J. Hardee, Marcus J. Wright, John C. Carter, and Benjamin F. Cheatham. After the war he returned to his law practice, and then was elected as a Democrat to first represent Tennessee’s 6th, then it’s 7th Congressional District in the United States House of Representatives, serving from 1871 to 1883. When Senator Howell Edmunds Jackson resigned hos Senate seat to accept the nomination of United States Circuit Court Judge in 1886 Washington C. Whitthorne was elected to the Senate to fill the vacancy. He finished out the term in March 1887 and returned to the House of Representatives, having been re-elected to represent the 7th District in 1886. He served his second stint in Congress until March 1891, when he retired. He died only a few months later in his home in Columbia, Tennessee in September 1891.
US Congressman, US Senator. An 1843 graduate of what is today the University of Tennessee, he read law and was admitted to the Tennessee State Bar Association in 1845. He served in the Tennessee State Senate and in the Tennessee State Legislature, serving as Speaker of the House during the Secession Crisis from 1859 to 1861. When the Civil War began he was appointed as Adjutant General of Tennessee, and in that capacity facilitated the raising of thousands of troops for the Confederate Army in the beginning months of the conflict. He then served in the field through the end of the war as an assistant adjutant general and aide on the successive staffs of Confederate army Generals Samuel Reid Anderson, William J. Hardee, Marcus J. Wright, John C. Carter, and Benjamin F. Cheatham. After the war he returned to his law practice, and then was elected as a Democrat to first represent Tennessee’s 6th, then it’s 7th Congressional District in the United States House of Representatives, serving from 1871 to 1883. When Senator Howell Edmunds Jackson resigned hos Senate seat to accept the nomination of United States Circuit Court Judge in 1886 Washington C. Whitthorne was elected to the Senate to fill the vacancy. He finished out the term in March 1887 and returned to the House of Representatives, having been re-elected to represent the 7th District in 1886. He served his second stint in Congress until March 1891, when he retired. He died only a few months later in his home in Columbia, Tennessee in September 1891.
Bio by: RPD2
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